Before last Monday night, the only place I would have expected to see Paradise Lost, Katatonia, and Devin Townsend all named together would be on a list of metal's early 90s pioneers, or perhaps even as inductees of the same class into the Heavy Metal Hall of Fame. The ceremony, most likely taking place in Stockholm, might include guest performances from early associates like Steve Vai, Mikael Åkerfeldt, and the Cavanagh clan. A lofty list of personages, to be sure, but one absolutely earned by the bands they would be honoring. All hypothetically speaking, of course. And though that may all yet come to pass someday in those illusory halls—I'll put in for press credentials now—until then we will gladly make do with 'Epic Kings & Idols', the real-life tour that brought the three together at the Bottom Lounge in Chicago. This was more a matter of good timing than any celestial homage, for the tour coincides with 2012 records released by all three bands, each reaffirming the bands' status as genre stalwarts while refusing to rest on the laurels of their halcyon days. For they are not yet past... --Etiam